New technology is jewel in crown of Innovation Centre's service

The Centre is part of the University of Central England in Birmingham and was set up 10 years ago to assist the jewellery and silversmithing industries with new technology applications. The new machines form part of a refurbishment made possible by funding from regional development agency Advantage West Midlands (AWM). “As well as the fully refurbished CAD training suite and its range of CAD softwares, the centre has used this significant funding to update all of the technology available to our client companies and research partners,” said technical manager Frank Cooper. “We can now rightfully claim to offer unrivalled access to a unique collection of complementary Rapid Manufacturing (RM) and Rapid Prototyping (RP) technologies right here in the heart of the West Midlands, as a result offer the following equipment and technologies to those companies and organisations working in partnership with us.” The equipment supplied by HK Technologies is: [] An Objet Eden 250 that uses Ultra thin-layer Polyjet technology in 16 micron resolution and with a build envelope of 250 x 250 x 200 mm; [] An Objet Eden 350V that also uses Ultra thin layer Polyjet technology in 16 micron resolution and with a build envelope of 350 x 350 x 200 mm. As the JIIC is part funded by European Regional Development Funds, it is able to offer up to 30 hours’ free new product development assistance utilising this equipment and technology to eligible West Midlands-based companies.